The John James blog has of late thrown up many hooks to hang our theories on and provided much food for thought on the Rangers issue.
His casual invective against individuals, particularly Dave King, and often members of the Bench is not particularly SFM-like in its approach, but despite the industrial nature of much of the discourse, the value of his work cannot be denied.
On the subject of revisiting LNS, I find myself in agreement with his conclusions. His argument about Celtic’s attitude to Resolution 12 is to my mind compelling insofar as it serves as a barometer for Celtic’s disposition towards rocking the SPL/SFA boat. Like him, I cannot see any real evidence, (despite the recent statement by the club) that they are disposed to move in the direction of a revisited LNS (although it should be noted that besides Celtic there are another 40 clubs who may have an opinion on this).
His conclusions though should not be confused with his opinion on the rights and wrongs of LNS. Like most of us, he appears to be of the opinion that LNS was seriously flawed on multiple counts.
I saw Bill McMurdo’s remarks too in reference to the same topic. He alleges that the whole SFA house of cards would come down if information he has at his fingertips, information that off-book payments in Scottish football was much more widespread that the RFC EBTs, was made public.
If what he says is true, and he has evidence, he should be expanding on the innuendo.
If he chooses not to, then he is as complicit as those he accuses.
In any event, to say that no action should be taken because others have done it is not the same as saying that no action WILL be taken.
If he means the former, then he is wrong. By the logic of that argument it follows that burglars for example should not be prosecuted because other people burgle houses but didn’t get caught.
I suspect he knows himself that by any objective standard, this view is in error, because when he is called out on it, he reverts to ad hominem attacks on those who called him on it. No defence, just withering, dismissive sarcasm – in the manner of former pundit Jim Traynor when he refers to those who speak of sporting integrity.
If he means the latter, then he should do what he can do prevent it and make his information public. I believe he knows that the £3 note fraternity runs through Scottish football like lettering on a stick of seaside rock, but I suspect he doesn’t actually have evidence.
If there is evidence, then McMurdo is in a unique position to get it out in the open and make life difficult for those he alleges are corrupt.
Then we should go back in time as far as possible to investigate those who participated in “black money” schemes, whether they are EBTs, other forms of tax dodge, or just money in a brown paper bag.
I do not believe that any of us participating in the Scottish Football Monitor would fear exposure of any of our clubs. I think we all know that this is far more important than club loyalties.
If McMurdo’s information is correct, then we also have the opportunity to show that the clamour for revisiting LNS is not an anti-Rangers with-hunt. Instead of reconvening LNS, let’s have Bill’s info, and constitute a wider enquiry. If the info was made public, and it will now be difficult for him to put his genie back into the bottle, could the SFA and the clubs resist the pressure for such an enquiry?
Maybe McMurdo’s intervention/revelation may yet be seen as a seminal moment in the campaign to rid ourselves of corruption and incompetence in football.
Our position has always been clear. Corruption is counter to sporting integrity. Therefore it must be rooted out.
John James and Merlin are probably correct in that the clubs will seek to thwart any move for a new enquiry; and there could easily have been a deal done with King last week.
However there was also a deal done with Charles Green about the new club being parachuted into the SPL. How did that one turn out?
I’m sure we’ve all noticed the increase in the number of squirrels infesting Scotland, emanating most notably from the Govan and Hampden areas, though one, at least, has been spotted in the North East of the country. Well there’s now a family of squirrels, two generations actually, appearing in print and online. The McMurdo family, well soaked in ‘Rangersness’, have been squirreling about throwing the seeds of fear at the supporters, but probably mostly aimed at the directors of the other, long time, members of the SFA and Scottish League in all it’s incarnations.
It appears McMurdo senior has names of players from a number of clubs that have had deals and contracts of a not particularly kosher type. He thinks this should mean that everyone should lay off RFC and stop demanding title stripping. His son, a relatively recent convert to ‘sensible’ online posts and an ‘enemy’ of the current board, has been making sure this ‘news’ is relayed to the sensible bears who read John James blog, and I’m sure JJ himself will be keen, as a Rangers supporter, to have him, McMurdo junior, help preserve the titles of the dead club.
Four years after the cheating was made public, McMurdo senior decides to announce he knows that other clubs were up to dodgy dealings that might cause consternation amongst directors and supporters afraid that his revelations might result in trophies won being ‘stripped’. Well, as has been said so often, why now? Why not just prior to LNS, or immediately after Mark Daly’s documentary? He’s a private individual, not tied to Scottish football or to it’s governance, he could have gone to the papers at any time and become the Rangers hero I’ve no doubt he’s always wanted to be. Instead he just happens to choose a time when there’s an orchestrated campaign to discourage calls for title stripping; pure coincidence, I’m sure. Or is there fear that the courts will finally ensure the EBTs used by RFC were illegal, and therefor, whether the football governors deal with it or not, there will be no denying Rangers Cheated? Looks like it’s his role to let us know that others cheated too, but we’ll just have to take his word on it – the word of a football agent
yeh right!
Not surprisingly, he’s not prepared to name names, or clubs, he just wants us all to know he knows things. He knows things because he was a footballers’ agent. Not a particularly honourable profession, and hated by many who have the good of football, the world over, at heart. He may, for all I know, have been a very honourable agent, though, and not involved himself in any dodgy dealings. But there lies his credibility problem, if he wasn’t involved in any of these dodgy dealings he alludes to, then his assertions are, at the very best, hearsay, nothing more, and as worthless as a sworn testimony from Dave King. Assuming he is that honourable agent, then he will have to ask the dodgy agents to admit their part in the illegal dealings he claims took place. I doubt any such agent would be prepared to face the possible police investigation that might follow. So hearsay it must remain.
In addition, we know, beyond doubt, that David Murray is not shy of dodgy deals and contracts with football players and their agents, and Mr McMurdo was involved with one or two players moving to, and probably from, Rangers. He might, if he does open his mouth completely, find that it’s not only the DOS/EBT decade that sees titles stripped from RFC, but the nine in a row era might suddenly be reduced to the odd one in a row instead!
I don’t know how long ago it is since Mr McMurdo ceased being a football agent, but suspect it’s long enough for many of the current directors of Scottish football clubs to be innocent of any claimed wrongdoings at the time of his involvement. They may be free of personal responsibility, but unsure if what he claims is true or not, and will be loath to risk sparking an investigation that may lead to, at the very least, a black mark against their club. That, I would imagine, will be what he is hoping for. Throw the seeds of doubt and fear; squirreling at it’s best.
We can, of course, rely on the SMSM to ensure that minimal questioning of his credibility is allowed, while ramping up the ‘for the good of Scottish football, don’t strip the titles’ mantra
. Squirrels and their nuts…
AJ
Excellent post re McMurdo and his obviously squirrelling tactics on behalf of his one and only love…. Other than money,that is.
In all of this long running saga, the one thing that never seems to get mentioned is the role of the agents.
Who offered players to the club?
Who handled the wage negotiations?
Who took a % of the money paid?
Who must have been aware of the side letters?
Agents such as McMurdo and, IIRC, Gordon Smith among others.
So, who declared the agent’s cut to the authorities? I’m sure that they would not only have had a cut of the declared wages but also the amounts listed in the side letters.
You can’t tell me these fine upstanding chaps would have turned their long snouts up at making money by only having a % of the declared, contractual wages. Aye, right.
So how were they paid their extra bit?
EBT,anyone??
Therefore,like AJ, I think that McMurdo’s veiled threats are just empty rhetoric and nothing more.
He and all the rest of them would have much more to lose than we would if anything were to be made public.
Keep that squirrel gun handy at all times!
Oh…….and Squirrels, they’re nuts!
(Fixed that for you AJ!)
Allyjambo @ 10.45
You would also have to query why McMurdo didn’t come forward with his own wee list just after the amnesty – I forget exactly when it was, late 2011 maybe – when all clubs were invited to come forward with their own off contract dodgy deals. After all, lying to the authorities (we assume they kept schtum if of course any such deals existed) when specifically asked for information is a major no no, is it not?
Allyjambo, an excellent piece on McMurdo senior. The answer to his implied threats is simple- put up or shut up. Let’s have your list, McMurdo, along with supporting evidence. The SFA can work through it, and where there is evidence of undisclosed payments, then a 3 point deduction can be applied to every game that an improperly registered player took part in. That is what the fans expect- proper and impartial application of the rules. If that means voiding 20 years of titles and cups, then so be it.
It is clearly McMurdo’s solemn duty as a citizen to provide his list not only to the SFA, but certainly also to HMRC and possibly even to Police Scotland. I expect no less from a staunchly loyal subject of Her Majesty. But I won’t be holding my breath.
Allyjambo 18th December 2015 at 10:45 am
‘…It appears McMurdo senior has names of players from a number of clubs that have had deals and contracts of a not particularly kosher type. He thinks this should mean that everyone should lay off RFC and stop demanding title stripping. ..’
________
What else would you expect of McMurdo, pere et fils, than to try to justify proven falsehood and deceit by an appeal on the grounds of ‘whataboutery’ , with unpleasant, blustering almost blackmailing-mode threats of exposure?
They are beneath contempt, both in their stupidity and in their would-be malice.
I metaphorically spit upon them, as on Paul Murray, with his ludicrous spiel about King’s QC making ” a simple mistake,he didn’t know the facts”.
(And what has poor Gala Fairydean Rovers done to deserve being in any way connected the most troubled TRFC and its dodgy directors?)
I saw McMurdo’s comments on JJ’s blog and reading it I wasn’t entirely sure whether he understands what the actual cheating was.
Use of the EBTs or DOS by themselves wasn’t cheating. By itself it was a matter between RFC/MIH and HMRC. If it was only about the use of the scheme it would only be about the tax due.
The cheating was:
1. The (deliberate?) failure to properly file all required paperwork as part of the player registration process i.e. the side letters. Not once or twice but over 80 times over a 12 year period. Breaches of player registration rules are normally dealt with severely by the footballing authorities.
2. Lying, on multiple ocassions, about the existence of said side letters to both HMRC and investigations by footballing authorities
3. Doing both 1 and 2 because they knew that it undermined their case that the schemes being used were legitimately
4. Lying about the status of their assessments from HMRC and subsequent appeals, particularly in relation to the wee tax case
Now it may be the case that other Clubs used EBTs or other similar tax dodges, and if they did I would hope that they would have a reckoning and/or settlement with HMRC. There has never been an allegation that any other Club did any of the 4 things above.
ZT,
Ref the vagueness as to what was actually done wrong, to think of a relevant comparison:
A simple reconstruction to 16 clubs will always have a whiff of the ‘co-incidentally helpful’ about it but wouldn’t be cheating per se (as long as the majority of clubs are in favour and can publicly state said vote having considered the inevitable consequences on their own supports).
Reconstruction to 16 clubs to bring in club4, a new shiny bright post admin club whilst finishers 3 & 2 are basically saying what Dundee said in August 2012, something along the lines of “yup we’re all well and grateful but haud the bus, this could cause us more problems than it solves” is, I would posit (thanks JJ) cheating!
BBC Scotland’s reporter Brian McLachlin quotes Paul Murray as saying that the Rangers v Hibs game a week on Monday,” is going to be the biggest game in Britain that weekend, which is fantastic. That must be good for Scottish football.”
Hearts host Celtic on the Sunday, Manchester United play Chelsea on Monday, the same day as the “biggest game”, and on Tuesday there is Leicester City v Manchester City.
No further comment is necessary.
Again no comment or questions from BBC Scotland, just sycophantic statements.
View Comment
John Clark 18th December 2015 at 11:14 am # I metaphorically spit upon them, as on Paul Murray, with his ludicrous spiel about King’s QC making ” a simple mistake,he didn’t know the facts”. (And what has poor Gala Fairydean Rovers done to deserve being in any way connected the most troubled TRFC and its dodgy directors?)
——————————————————————————————–
He has a BIG HOOSE just along the road. There are a lot of “bears” in the Borders!
Ally, I say if that is the case, then bring it on. This shouldn’t just be about all corrupt matters Ibrox way – if any of the other clubs have been up to anything dodgy, then McMurdo should report it forthwith, and we can finally start the clear out of the flotsam and jetsam, not just at the SFA, but at all our clubs as well.
It’s clear he’s trying to use it as leverage to put pressure on other clubs to do ‘the right thing’ (as he sees it) – the problem is that any club that does give into these demands are dead in the water anyway. As we already saw in 2012, their own fans won’t stand for it.
Regarding the mystery of the £5 million loan and why all the talk of it now.
Is it yet another squirrel? To put the blame on Mike Ashley for the lack of any transfer activity in the upcoming window?
Sorry, we can’t sign anyone, we had to pay £5 million to Ashley.
Sorry, we had to sell Tavernier/Waghorn/Law/Clark because we had to pay £5 million to Ashley.
Etc.
RIFC have posted their latest AR01 (Annual Return) at Companies House with the return date of 16/11/15.
The list of major shareholders is quite different from previous ones, so extreme caution should be exercised as to the accuracy of the return.
Beaufort Nominees is listed as the biggest shareholder with almost 17M shares
I’ll cross check the numbers with previous returns to try and identify the beneficial owners.
Could it be
The real reason the £5m loan is to be repaid ( if genuine and not a squirrel) is to immediately use it as security for all rolled up loans, including the £5m due to the RRM?
Followed by an RIFC insolvency event in which the new RRM owners of the IP claim the right to pre-pack the insolvency as the single biggest creditor of RIFC?
Followed by a sale to the MA surrogate Sarver (Ashley) where the RRM get their money back and maybe even a small profit ?
Rangers fans: In the following comments taken from an Aberdeen fan site, I’ve edited out the most colourful references to your club, but you may still find some of it too partisan; not suited to these pages – which is fair enough. Fan sites are rarely impartial.
Moderators: I hope it passes the test. The swear words retained feel valid; an authentic form of emphasis. A couple of borderline analogies may make you twitch momentarily, however.
Everyone: here is a selection of comments from the Aberdeen fan forum I darken. An imperfect survey, but surely enough to give pause for those who insist there is no appetite – except from a few meddlesome, bitter Celtic fans – for justice and change. To date, the disappointment and or revulsion at Stewart Milne’s comments has been unanimous, as evidenced below:
“Disgusted with the club for this.”
“…our chairman…speaks only for his own narrow minded, backward thinking self. Thank god for the Sir Turnbull Hutton’s of this world. RIP min, I wish you had been ours.”
“Does anyone agree with him or know anyone that does?”
“Well Stewarty, I for one would prefer teams that didn’t cheat and avoid paying taxes in the top league than so called “Top sides”. All Stewarty can see is the pound signs. What a sad but predictable statement by our chairman.”
“It’s hugely embarrassing what Milne has said, and I for one feel that he can’t continue in his role anymore…to come away with a statement like that shows how clearly detached from our support (and every other clubs support) he is. I think as a fanbase, we need a voice through which we can express how much we disagree with his statement. We need to put pressure on him to resign. His comments are fully unacceptable.”
“To say I am disappointed is an understatement, giving the line of time to move on and start to build the game…Rubbish, this can only be done if we are rid of cheats…Massive own goal from Milne.”
“Perhaps someone should remind Mr Milne that in all the years that Rangers cheated, we didn’t benefit from it. There was no competition because the Glasgow 2 were wrapping up everything, while one blatantly gained advantage by cheating.
The statement is embarrassing and of the same mind-set as Doncaster and Regan… and that alone is a worry.”
“…the modern Scottish football fan is relishing the game at the moment, with different winners of the Scottish cup, the smaller scale clubs getting stronger and stronger plus of course a resurgent Aberdeen. Fans…don’t care about them any more, and they certainly don’t care about us when they talk about leaving the spfl at every opportunity. It’s not the supporters who need to move on, Mr Milne, it is you and your narrow view of how Scottish football used to be and where it is now; supporters adapt, clubs adapt and in many cases they are in better shape than they have been in years. Please stay as chairman, but by god man you need to listen to the punters.”
“Does he think the passage of time has made us forget and forgive? Time you had a reality check Stuarty my lad or you are going to have the people who are really important to the club on your back, you know, the ones who pay their cash…”
“I have never been so angry and disappointed at someone connected to my club…Stewart Milne, I have been involved with the Dons a lot longer than you and you do not talk for me. Scottish football was cheated. I was cheated. Every single fan at all clubs were cheated. How dare you tell me to move on.”
“Wanting the Govan [] in the top league because they bring in some money is like wanting the Yorkshire Ripper released because he’s handy with a hammer, and your new Ikea coffin needs nailed together. WTF was Milne thinking?”
“Yet another spectacular PR own goal from [Milne]. WTF was he thinking? .”
“The time to move on will be when Rangers fc are held to account and made to pay for all their cheating and not before. Distasteful though it may be, proper, though reluctant acceptance of the newco in our midst will come only after the trophies illegally gained by the oldco through cheating are removed from the Record books. Having said that, I would prefer them to disappear completely.”
“Dear Mr Milne, you do not speak for the majority of Aberdeen fans, who respect and demand an honest and transparent sport. And you certainly don’t speak for me. Please leave.”
“In competitive sport, to some extent your rivals can only prosper at your expense. If you let your rivals prosper at your expense by bullying and cheating because you fear the loss of income if you don’t, it’s no longer sport. If you do so in the teeth of the anger and contempt of the fans whose interests you are there to represent, you are not fit for purpose.”
“Forget sportsmanship, integrity and competitiveness, it’s big gates and TV that he clearly operates on and it is very worrying to see how out of touch he is with not only the fans, but the reality of the situation. Having the same mindset as Regan and Doncaster is only going to be detrimental to the future of the club. It sounds like I’m being extreme, but how can the club move in the direction the fans long desire it to, when our own chairman shares the view that the progress and changes we desire, aren’t the way forward, but rather a return to the fake good old days is the future? I have NO desire and I mean NO desire to ever see that shower of shite at Pittodrie again. Milne has ruined my illusion that the club shared the same thoughts as most fans did and I really can’t see how this relationship can work going forward.”
“What a [] plonker our chairman is. Almost 3 years of goodwill built up for him and he goes and shatters that goodwill in a couple of seconds with a dickhead statement.”
And that concludes the voting from the North East.
From the AR01 and previous returns, I will make the following guesses as to the holdings:
JIM Noninees is New Oasis Asset Limited (DCK’s Family Trust?)
Previously held 11,869,505 or 14.57%, now holds 12,052,931 or 14.79%
Morstan Nominees is George Taylor
Previously held 7,575,000 or 9.3%, still owns 7,575,000 or 9.3%
Goldman Sachs is Douglas Park
Previously held 5,000,000 or 6.14%, now owns 5,000,200 or 6.14%
MASH Holdings
Previously held 7,265,000 or 8.92%, now owns 4,265,000 or 5.23%
MASH originally acquired 4,265,000 shares from Hargreave Hale on 30/09/2014, then a day later Mike Ashley’s personal holding of 3,000,000 was transferred to MASH. It may be that the MASH shareholding has been split back into the original components
Beaufort Nominees was part of the original Easdale proxy block along with BPH, Margarita (ATP), Norne Ansalt, Putney Holdings etc.
The last figure I had for them was 5,076,337 or 7.8% in December 2013, which was separate from the BPH and Margarita holdings etc.
Also missing from the AR01 list (of shareholders with more than 5%) is Sandy Easdale’s personal holding of 5,256,110 or 6.45%
My guess is that Beaufort Nominees now represents a consolidation of their previous holdings, Sandy Easdale’s personal holding, Mike Ashley’s personal holding and a few others.
The Beaufort holding of 16,983,046 or 20.84% added to MASH’s 4,265,000 or 5.23% gives a total of 26.07% which was close to the dissenting share of the votes for each resolution at the recent AGM.
BP, I was interested in your bullet point that said ICT had sent you their roster for press conferences. Does this mean that SFM can attend their press conferences? If so, might other clubs follow suit?
If that’s the case, could one SFM member close to each club attend each club’s press conferences and ask some of the questions that need asked? I know press conferences tend to be held by managers/players but, for example, would it be fair to ask Derek McInnes what he thinks of Stuart Milne’s comments?
Would we be in the same position as SMSM hacks in that we would fear being banned from future press conferences if we asked such questions? If we played the game with manager/player-type conferences, might we be allowed access to board members?
Sorry for all the questions – just wondering if there’s a way in to ask the questions we need answered. I realise that even if we got the chance to ask them, we’d be banned soon enough, I guess.
Amazingless at 2pm
The comments on that AFC forum are brilliant….from farmyard animals to the Yorkshire Ripper in a few lines.
Although, I am slightly concerned about the person who referred to thinking about getting jiggy with the farmyard animals….not the first comparsion that would automatically spring to mind. Given the forum, was he, perchance, thinking about a certain type of woolly farmyard animal?
I’ll get ma sheepskin
It certainly is alleged that we do like a bit of lamb from time to time 🙂
Merlin says on JJ’s blog that if we open Pandora’s box we might not like what comes out.
I say, bring it on.
To use a different classical metaphor, our game currently stinks like the Augean stables. We need to reroute the river and flush the whole thing out.
If the sins of other Clubs come to light then so be it, it may hurt at the time but our game will be all the better for it long term. One of the reason that lance Armstrong’s TdF titles have not be awarded to anyone else is because almost every other rider in the Top 10 those years is also a proven drug cheat, if other Clubs titles are voided in addition to Rangers then so be it.
What must happen though is that me must get the truth, we must punish the wrongdoers and exclude them from positions of influence in our game, and we must make sure that it doesn’t happen again.
If a Govan club happens to be top of the pile after all of that then that’s fine, equally if they do not continue to exist, or are in a lower league then that should be equally fine.
Some time ago Auldheid wrote a blog entitled “An honest game, honestly governed”. The blog’s title was a question, but in the end of the day that is all I want from Scottish football. If we have an honest game honestly governed then I can accept any outcome.
ElCapitano2013: 8th December 2015 3:22 pm:
The comments on that AFC forum are brilliant….from farmyard animals to the Yorkshire Ripper in a few lines. Although, I am slightly concerned about the person who referred to thinking about getting jiggy with the farmyard animals….not the first comparsion that would automatically spring to mind. Given the forum, was he, perchance, thinking about a certain type of woolly farmyard animal? I’ll get ma sheepskin…
……………………………………………………………………………………………………
Glad you liked them, ElCapitano, I enjoyed reading them, too.
Regrettably, I had already responded on the Aberdeen forum to the comment you mention before reading your take on things here. And so, to recap and clarify, the exchange on the Aberdeen forum now reads:
InversneckieDob: That’s like wanting to get jiggy with farmyard animals. A distasteful thought, but if, for some bizarre reason, you think it, you sure as f*ck dinna say it out loud.
Amazingless: I lose count of the dates I ruined by failing to remember this simple truth.
I hope this helps clear matters up and gives you some insight into the righteous calibre of the human beings over there. (All further enquires should be directed to the police.)
The problem for a weegie moderating an AFC forum posting is simply one of language 🙂
I inferred the meaning of the word ‘jiggy’ – subsequently it appears correctly. However we are a family forum, so less with the jiggy.
Google was my friend for some other definitions – which creative and colourful as they may have been, had to be left on the cutting room floor
Big Pink:
The problem for a weegie moderating an AFC forum posting is simply one of language
I inferred the meaning of the word ‘jiggy’ – subsequently it appears correctly. However we are a family forum, so less with the jiggy.
Google was my friend for some other definitions – which creative and colourful as they may have been, had to be left on the cutting room floor
…………………………………………………………….
Ha.
Sorry, I didn’t see your comment until I’d posted my second comment (above). There will be no more Jiggy.
For what it’s worth, in my own editing and selection of the comments (applied before submitting them here), it was the language (and personalised abuse) towards Stewart Milne that proved more problematic than anything else. Industrial.
And that’s nothing to do with his recent comments, it’s been that way since about 1997 and the appointment of Alex Miller!
Al this talk of McMurdo and his cronies knowing what lies in Pandoras box ……….Get it opened now or shut up !!!! As a celtic fan and all fans of the various clubs Im sure we want it out in the open. If any of our clubs have sinned ala rangers then hell mend them they have to be punished for it. BUT if McMurdo and pals knew real info regarding the other clubs they would be singing from the roof tops about it ….so would the SMM ……….Giant squirrel in a santa outfit me thinks……..Go on Mr. McMurdo prove all us bampots wrong ????
Getting hold of press releases is maybe a bigger issue than we were assuming. There was even a suggestion that they are published on this site. That would give the game away that the so called journalists are like little lassies cutting out scraps from the releases and filling their pages. Professionals? Oh aye. (I admit that image of my sister is rather dated …)
[Thanks BP for resolving access issue.]
==========================
Following on from BP’s post above, here’s another suggestion to help Scottish football ‘move on’…
Any reasonable person would expect that the LNS Commission should be revisited – but the SPFL/SFA and the clubs themselves seem to be extremely reluctant to even raise the matter in public – despite it being a constant ‘hot topic’ amongst the paying fans.
So to help the weasel like administrators duck out of making a tough decision, why doesn’t the SPFL invite the chairpersons of each of the 41 clubs to vote yes/no on a motion to revisit LNS ?
If they vote a majority of ‘yes’ then an independent review is happening.
If they vote a majority of ‘no’ then that’s it: time to ‘move on’ and forget about RFC’s past mistakes.
This suggested vote could conveniently shift the pressure away from Hampden and onto the clubs of course.
The fans would then have the opportunity to make their feelings known quite plainly to their clubs before they vote.
If the chairpersons vote a majority ‘yes’ for a review, then Hampden and the clubs can complain all they like in the SMSM, and ultimately just blame the fans for an ‘unnecessary inquiry, blah blah blah’.
TRFC and their fans can be helpfully directed to aim their vitriol at the fans of the other clubs.
And Hampden can later claim to ‘have listened’ to the fans and acted accordingly [!], and that this LNS review is the first tangible step to moving on…for all the clubs in Scottish football.
Yes, I know…
BP, another thing to consider when discussing McMurdo’s revelation, if he does reveal ‘what he knows’ it is likely to harm his ex-clients as much, if not more, than any clubs involved. In fact, unlike EBTs, any unmet tax liability will very likely fall on the players involved, and they might not take too kindly to that. I imagine he will enjoy a Christmas spent fending off calls from worried past footballers, requesting clarification of the contracts he put together for them, with the odd threat of ‘you can be sure I’m not going down alone…’
If Scottish football clubs have been involved in what McMurdo alludes to, he is not going to be the one who brings the evidence to the authorities, as only someone untainted with the money that flies around football would dare. Like a zealous HMRC employee looking to crack down on EBTs, perhaps.
However, if Scottish footballers have been involved in improper or illegal contracts, Mr McMurdo can do us all a favour by ensuring the authorities take them to account, along with their agents, for every penny they are due in unpaid tax and NI. If the sport I love is going to be ruined by those out to protect Rangers and it’s replacement club, it might as well go down with those who have caused it’s ruin.
Test post to see if access problem now resolved.
Apologies
Lord Carloway has been announced as the new Lord President, Scotland’s most senior judge.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-35133550
Maybe using “common sense” to see through ludicrous contrived series’ of transactions designed purely to avoid paying tax is the right way to go.
The utterly bogus dichotomy between business and sport in Scottish football has never been starker than it is now. The supreme irony is that there is no actual dichotomy, and can never be any dichotomy between sport and business in any professional sport. This is absolutely understood by all professional sports, except it would appear, Football.
Those who earn a living by the game, players, ex players, journos, Scottish Football Authorities, er al are all locked in a dark pact to get us back to where we were , regardless of the actual impossibility of that. They would, utterly idiotically, and nonsensically , claim that they are pragmatists, or realists focussing on the business of the game. They have, to a person, forgotten that this business is built upon sport, and that sport has a fundamental rules based integrity. Without this, it ceases to be a sport, and without the sport, there ceases to be a business.
I just wonder what levels of stupidity the denizens of the football business inhabit that they cannot understand the fundamentals of the business from which they earn a living.
The sport is the business. Without a fair sport, there is no money to be made, there is no audience, there are bo fans.
I despair not just at the total lack of moral fibre, respect for rules, disregard for decency, and sense of responsibility shown by the Football industry, such as it I in Scotland, but more at the sheer stupidity and lack of awareness if where its own self interest and survival lies.
FWIW I think the decision to issue Sevco a licence was the end point for the sport: A flagrant breach from which it could never recover, as a sport, and consequently as a business. Everything since has largely been a playing out of the consequences of the decision by those charged with regulating the game to opt to destroy it.
Buried in the comments section of his blog, John James (as ‘sitonfence’ at 1815 today) makes this bold declaration:
“What’s in it for the Chairmen of the clubs most affected by this tax evasion? Do you think they give a damn whether Rangers have 54 titles or 47? Do you believe they are going to pursue BDO for lost prize money? There is nothing in it for the chairmen so why bother engaging in the expense, effort and division in the SPFL and SFA that it would cause. Just to stop Rangers fans stating our 54 beats your 44?”
Sorry John, you’ve missed the point.
Fairness, integrity, the same rules for all. Do you think that club chairmen (and the SFA, SPFL, UEFA & FIFA) want empty stadia because of this abandonment of the rules to suit one club? Revisiting LNS would be unifying, not divisive: a chance at a new, clean start.
From your point of view, the game is up, the game is dead.
Homunculus 18th December 2015 at 6:45 pm #
‘Lord Carloway has been announced as the new Lord President, Scotland’s most senior judge…..
Maybe using “common sense” to see through ludicrous contrived series’ of transactions designed purely to avoid paying tax is the right way to go.”
_________
I would imagine that , if Lord Carloway’s Court has refused leave to appeal, there is little likelihood of the Supreme Court over-ruling that refusal and allowing the appeal to be made, because there is little likelihood of there being grounds for appeal in law.
I say this on the basis that such high judicial office must involve those responsible for making the appointment ensuring that a proposed candidate ticks all the boxes relevant to professional expertise and the respect of fellow professionals before any other qualifications for the post are even looked at.
Carloway’s professional record will have been studied- right up to his most recent judgements, to make sure that there are no apparent ‘banana skin’ cases that might cause concern in the near future-after he has been installed.
And any candidate for the top job ( does anyone know whether ‘applications’ are sought for the Lord president post, or is a discreet tap on the shoulder?) is likely to have been on the legal ball consistently throughout his entire career in law, especially over the time he/she has been a judge.
I may, of course, be wrong- and perhaps things at the top, at the interface between things political and things legal, are as murky as they ever were in former times, when incompetent place-men were elevated to high office regardless of professional skill or merit.
JJ (our version).
nail on head squarely hit. I’ve no interest in 44,47, 54 or any other number. I need something to adequately reflect the money I wasted for 10 years. I personally can’t get my money back, nor can the clubs I supported. So what’s left? Yes I could walk on, ignore the cheating for 12 years and leave the perpetrators (who lets not forget were caught) to enjoy their spoils, taunt at their spoil count relative to mine and lecture me, from a lower division how I should feel and how I should run my game. But I won’t and it’s p!ss all to do with 52 vs 47.
With sincere apologies to Clement Clarke Moore
‘Twas the week before Christmas, when all thro’ the big house Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse; The stockings were hung by the chimney with care, In hopes that King David soon would be there; The people were nestled all snug in their beds, While visions of war chests danc’d in their heads,
And mama in her ‘kerchief, and I in my tap, Had just settled our brains for a long winter’s nap — When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter, I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash, Tore open the shutters, and flung up the sash. The moon on the breast of the new fallen snow, Gave the luster of mid-day to objects below; When, what to my wondering eyes should appear, But a big bloody tank and eight muckle reindeer, With a big round driver, so lively and quick,
I knew in a moment it must be SD Mick. More rapid than eagles his consigliere they came, And he whistled, and shouted, and call’d them by name: “Now! Mashley, now! Hellawell ya Dancer, now! Jenkins ya Vixen, “On! Pearson, on! Bentley, on! Singleton and Blitz-em; “To the top of the porch! To the top of the wall! “Now Mash away! Mash away! Mash away all!”
As dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly, When they met with an obstacle, and appeared on sky; So up to the big house-top the consigliere they flew, With a chest full of war — and SD Mick too
And then in a twinkling, I heard on the roof The prancing and pawing of each big hoof. As I drew in my head, and was turning around, Down the chimney SD Mick came with a bound: He was dress’d all in fur, from his head to his foot, And his clothes were all tarnish’d with ashley and loot;
A bundle of consigliere were flung on his back, And he look’d like a peddler just opening his pack: His eyes — how they twinkled! His dimples: how merry, His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry; His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow, And the skin of his face was as white as the snow;
The stump of a club he held tight in his teeth, And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath. He had a broad face, and a big round belly That shook when he laugh’d, like a bowl full of jelly: He was chubby and plump, a right jolly big elf, And I laugh’d when I saw him in spite of myself; With a wink of his eye and a twist of his head He gave King David to know, he had everything to dread. He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work, And fill’d all the consigliere pockets; and turn’d with a jerk, And laying his finger across his neck then aside of his nose
Pointing at King Dave with a smirk, out the door he goes He sprung to his tank,and to his team gave a whistle, And away the consigliere flew, like the down of a thistle: But I heard him exclaim, as he drove until dim
Happy Christmas to Me, and good night to Him.
As we approach the end of 2015 I thought it worth while reposting an earlier post of mine from April 2015.
==============================
• Auldheid says:
April 4, 2015 at 3:15 pm (Edit) The thing about Jim Spence I feel is that if he were not in the mainstream media he would be on here posting or blogging.
He cares about his club but is balanced, he cares about the game and loves both.
He was talking on Sportsound there about Dundee United being caught on the back foot on the matter of the make up of the managers contract in respect of player sales.
The conversation turned to transparency and for football to catch up in realising it has to become more transparent in its dealing with supporters.
What football has not realised is that transparency is already here but in a form that makes us slow to realise it.The medium is social media and the ability to share but contained by Slow Glass.
Slow Glass from a short story by Bob Shaw slows down the light passing through it.http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light_of_Other_Days
In the story and others you have Slow Glass of different thickness in terms of the time it takes for the light to emerge.
You have Glass a day thick/long to Glass ten years and more thick/long.
Thus the Utd story was captured by Slow Glass about 3 or 4 weeks thick. Maybe more or less as I don’t know the detail but you get the drift.
The Rangers story will emerge in full over 10 years thick glass.
The LNS story will take at least another year before the truth will emerge that shows it to have been a sham.Res12 if measured from the Celtic AGM in 2013 will take two years for the truth to emerge.
The thickness/slowness of the glass depends to a large extent on main stream journalist removing the dust of PR that slows the light, but light is inexorable.
It can do nothing but shine.
The sooner authority and not just football realise that transparency is already here emerging via Slow Glass the thinner the Glass will become.
No more waiting years for the truth to emerge, which might just make folk act truthfully and honestly in the first place. It will be an interesting future as social media replaces mainstream as music downloads replaced CDs ( that replaced tapes that replaced records that replaced cylinders)
In the meantime let’s keep our football Glass polished and hasten the emergence of light in our own landscape.
======================
In respect of the current blog and predictions, and a further 9 months down the line, more light is beginning to emerge via Slow Glass on Res12 in the shape of the article by BRTH at
http://linkis.com/wordpress.com/jpuFq
which tells supporter of all clubs and those who are shareholders exactly what they are up against and how their interests as supporters and tax payers have been and continue to be ignored by those governing the game who treat us with contempt..
Their motivation is in turn governed by the contracts, no matter how unsavoury or damaging to the integrity of football, that fill their wage packets. A factor which also drives our main stream media to an extent that they simply will not report anything they fear will hit them in the pocket.
In respect of Celtic’s appetite for Res12 I think that is immaterial for it is not their appetite that will need to be satisfied but that of the Celtic support when all the evidence that clearly demonstrates that RFC lied to UEFA in 2011 emerges from the slow glass.
It is only being retarded by the upcoming court cases where evidence from Charlotte Fakeovers may be called for, this in turn legitimises all the material which we know exists but has been studiously ignored by the msm.
It is one thing to think you are being treated as a mug and another knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt that you are.
Celtic simply cannot afford to take the risk of the impact on them once the whole narrative unfolds. Up to 50 shareholders already have the narrative in a form that makes it easy to distribute if necessary. After the court cases that involve the same individuals it can simply be published and it is already in the hands of interested journos in England.
On the LNS angle: thanks to SFM there cannot be a supporter in Scotland not affected by Rangersitis who does not know by now the original LNS Commission was a sham and that to ignore a final decision that RFC used ebts in an unlawful way (if it comes) would be tantamount to treating the customers the game depends on as fools. Such a decision would make Ratner look like a genius in comparison.
In ten years time there will be books covering the last 15 years but in less than 6 months Res12 and LNS if not revisited will provide all that is needed to justify a judicial review if that is what supporters want once the fog of the current propaganda war clears.
Just a wee thought on why the £5m or thereabouts is held by a solicitor rather than in an account belonging to TRFC or RIFC. What if we are right that administration is getting closer, would it not be wise to ensure that any money raised to repay the loan is held in an account not in the company/club name, so that, in the event their gambit to get free of MA doesn’t pay off, the money is returnable to the donors, even if the club plunges into insolvency before they can have their money returned.
Regardless of the actual reason it is (if it exists) held by a solicitor, I expect it gives the donors some comfort to know it is out of reach of the company’s creditors as it is not officially the company’s money/asset.
Edit: and also out of the reach of anyone they might not fully trust!
who is this mr mcmurdo and what evidence does he hold?,we should be told.
apologies to you mr hoops, after reading back again i can now see where you were coming from.like many aberdeen fans right now we are seeing red, so a little composure/rational went out the window. all the best to you. united we stand .
Amazingless 18th December 2015 at 2:00 pm
Thanks for posting that, Amazingless, the Dons supporters have certainly responded in a way that gives you back some of your pride in your club. I hope supporters of the rest of our clubs respond similarly, or even up the ante, when their time comes, as it almost surely will!
Allyjambo 18th December 2015 at 10:00 pm
‘..Just a wee thought on why the £5m or thereabouts is held by a solicitor ..’
_________
Not to suggest that you may not be entirely right in that thought,Aj, but that would smack to me as an attempt at very sharp practice indeed. And I can’t really see how it would help the Board.
The money, if it is there at all, must clearly be RIFC money,deposited by RIFC, however they managed to raise it.( I doubt if the individuals who contributed would be allowed to deposit with the company solicitor their own individual contributions as separate payments towards the total loan repayment?)
The solicitor would be holding it only ( as in the house purchase analogy used by Murray) as already belonging to SD, and as immediately payable to them when, and as soon as the ‘necessary documentation’ [i.e.SD’s signature acknowledging that the debt has been repaid and relinquishing anything that was being held as security for the loan has been received].
If that documentation is received in due form before any insolvency situation is declared, the money belongs to SD.
If insolvency happens before that, the money is there for the Administrators, and could not go back to whomever had put the money up!
That’s how I would read the situation.
I wonder if SD has asked the RIFC solicitor to confirm that he is in fact holding the £5m?
I would not be at all surprised if he doesn’t know that he’s supposed to be holding that sum!
Hi
I understand that The Scottish Football Monitor want to be on your mailing list for club updates/press releases etc but so far they have not received any response from my club.
Why is this? Surely we are in favour of sharing information and gaining maximum exposure for our club.
I hope you can help with this because I would very much like our club to use all media outlets to promote the club and not have to rely on the DR etc who traditionally only report the bad news from our club.
Even when we had the best spell for 30 years it was hard to find anything good about us in the press and radio.
Regards
Bogsey
A life long fan of 41 years.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Sent to Motherwell Board Chair. Hope it helps.
But I doubt it as the campaign to ” Elevate the Four” continues. I lost count but i believe we are up to three squirrels a day minimum.
As BRTH says in his magnificent blog – Operation Cover Up continues and spin is thrown at us to obfuscate the truth.
Also plaudits to BP and AJ for their posts above for skillfully cutting through the spin and analysing and telling it like it is.
John Clark 18th December 2015 at 10:38 pm
I doubt very much that at this time the donors will have made loans of their money to TRFC/RIFC, and I’d be very surprised if the money held by the solicitors is held in either company’s name. It will almost certainly be held in the solicitors name at their bank with a designation, such as ‘I P Squint LLB Client a/c TITS’. This is perfectly normal and many of us will have had money held by solicitors in this way without knowing it, pending the purchase of a house or similar. In this instance I would expect to find there is documentation held by the solicitors, copied to all involved, releasing the funds to TRFC should SD agree to repayment, but returned to each donor in the event that the intended repayment to SD fails. This is actually a proceedure aimed at protecting clients in the event of their solicitor’s bankruptcy and will protect the donors in a similar fashion. The £5m will probably never hit a TRFC/RIFC account as, on their clients’instructions, the solicitors will pay the money directly to SD and at the same time process the loan documentation which is probably already executed pending the hoped for event. There is nothing underhand in this type of arrangement, indeed, if you think of it like the purchase of furniture, where the cash is paid up front only for the company to go burst before delivery, the customer will lose his money, standing in line along with other creditors. How much more honest a situation it is to only pay on completion of the contract, which is what the donors will be entering into (a contract) with the new loans, assuming they are making them with the express, and only, intention of paying back SD.
I’d go as far as to say, if they haven’t protected their money in this, or a similar, fashion, then they trully are idiots.
Lord Nimmo Smith sowed the seeds of his commission’s destruction when he dragged EBT’s into his judgement. His inquiry terms of reference concerned mis-registration of players. On this count the accused club were found culpable and were fined, out of all proportion with precedent, £250,000 for their ‘misdemeanours’.
When LNS cited the current legality of EBT’s at the time of his judgement and used this to justify the ‘no sporting advantage’ finding, he effectively put a time bomb under the conclusions of his inquiry. He must have known that the HMRC pursuit of the accused club’s EBT scheme was a saga that had some way to run and that the final outcome could not be easily predicted. Therefore to predicate the commissions findings on the then legality of EBT’s made the judgement a hostage to fortune.
It appeared to me at the time that this ruse acted as a sticking plaster to cover a gaping wound. The paucity of the fine levied could surely only be justified if the level of culpability could be made to seem less significant than it actually was. Or perhaps LNS wanted his judgement to self destruct some time after he had left the scene so that this flaw would erase itself from history in the fullness of time.
That there will have been financial impropriety within football over a long period should not be in doubt. However up until MGMRT EBT’s, such impropriety had not been conducted on an industrial scale. That is why MGMRT EBT’s needed to be held up as an example to illustrate that there were indeed rules and they could be implemented if necessary: Even if such implementation was weak and risible.
LNS is dead in the water. It served its purpose for a time but now it is destined for Davy Jones locker. The latest ‘whataboutery’ is the current episode in the charade called ‘no smoke without mirrors’.
What for me has been rather distressing is the undignified defence by the accused club of it’s own position. “You can’t take our titles”, “over our dead body” (see what I did there), is the mantra. How very very dare they. Not content with having poisoned the atmosphere within the national sport, they now berate us for seeking restitution. How very, very dare they. It displays an immense contempt for their fellow football association clubs. Not a word of regret. No hint of an apology. All the while the blame is shifted to wherever a ledge can be found to precariously rest it on.
If a more effective method exists to etch this memory into the psyche of the Scottish Football supporting public then it must be a very abrasive implement indeed. Apparently an ex-Prime Minister once said (or was it Denis Healy), “When you’re in a hole, stop digging”.
Allyjambo 19th December 2015 at 12:09 am
‘.. It will almost certainly be held in the solicitors name at their bank with a designation, such as ‘I P Squint LLB Client a/c TITS’.’
______
I defer to your greater knowledge of these things.
And isn’t it terrible that in this world of ours, sneaky financial cheats can find all these ‘legitimate’ ways to lie, cheat and steal their way through life, no sense of honour, fathers of children who must grow up either to be the same ( Mc..), or ashamed to be the children of charlatans and conmen…
Today, I listened to Lady Antonia Fraser telling us, in the passing, that her expenses incurred while travelling about the country when researching material for her biography of Mary, Queen of Scots, were put down for tax purposes as ‘optical research’.
Trust the aristocracy of Anglo-Ireland to know every blessed tax wrinkle.
Harold Pinter might have written a play about that.
But he married her!
John Clark 19th December 2015 at 2:04 am
John, I think we have to remember that, with regards to the availability of the £5m, we don’t know for a fact that they are telling porkies, we are basing our assumptions purely on past behaviour. They may well have this money, or most of it, held by a solicitor for use in exactly the way they are stating. The repayment might, in the end, not be made, but that won’t prove that the money was never there. I do, though, share your scepticism.
With regard to the solicitors client funds facility, this is a very good and necessary system, forming a very important role in the everyday work of solicitors. It helps keep them honest, if nothing else
, and is vital where payment is to be made on a contract after conditions are met. Unfortunately, as with most good things in life, there are dishonest people out there who will use it to their own dishonest ends, including, as we suspect here, the facility to fool a gullible customer base with a plausible untruth.
In the context of the lies and deceipt that have been perpetrated since the inception of DOS and EBTs and the birth of Sevco, this would be a particularly little one, as it might only fool those happy to believe, and might even be preventing the forming of a baying mob and any ensuing criminal acts. Compared to a claim published in the press that might well smack of blackmail, ‘lay off A for I know all about B’, it is a veritably innocent deception!
Castofthousands 19th December 2015 at 1:27 am # Lord Nimmo Smith sowed the seeds of his commission’s destruction when he dragged EBT’s into his judgement. His inquiry terms of reference concerned mis-registration of players. On this count the accused club were found culpable and were fined, out of all proportion with precedent, £250,000 for their ‘misdemeanours’……——————————————————–
CoT, you make many valid and interesting points. The subject however always reminds me that many of a blue persuasion, clearly with an irony by-pass, cite LNS as ‘legally deciding’ the OC/NC debate but at the same time feel no compunction about having not paid the fine levied as part of that ‘judgement’.
If they were a NC you might think that they had an argument of sorts but claiming, as they do, that they are the OC surely blows a body swerve of the fine out of the water.
Scottish Football needs a strong set of 42 senior clubs with transparency and financial fairness paramount.
BP,
I note the graphics that have appeared on the site. Is this some subliminal attempt to make reference to Mr Paul Murray, he of the famous hairstyle?
Are you really poking fun at his (alleged) dandruff problem? I think we should be told.
I’m not sure if PM can sue SFM for this – who knows, everyone else seems to be having their day(s) in court.
Scottish Football needs a strong head (and shoulders).
A bit American but it’s still true.
An explanation of escrow.
http://www.investopedia.com/terms/e/escrow.asp
redlichtie 19th December 2015 at 10:22 am
If you had any idea the lengths we had to go to get the right shade of that stuff ….
Allyjambo 19th December 2015 at 12:09 am # John Clark 18th December 2015 at 10:38 pm
It will almost certainly be held in the solicitors name at their bank with a designation, such as ‘I P Squint LLB Client a/c TITS’. This is perfectly normal and many of us will have had money held by solicitors in this way without knowing it, pending the purchase of a house or similar. In this instance I would expect to find there is documentation held by the solicitors, copied to all involved, releasing the funds to TRFC should SD agree to repayment, but returned to each donor in the event that the intended repayment to SD fails. This is actually a proceedure aimed at protecting clients in the event of their solicitor’s bankruptcy and will protect the donors in a similar fashion.
I’d go as far as to say, if they haven’t protected their money in this, or a similar, fashion, then they trully are idiots.
/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
Well the donors of the 5million must a bit anxious about the documents prepared to protect them if its held by the same solicitors firm who ”made the mistake in court” I would be a bit concerned handing over 5million pounds to someone who cant even get a few simple facts right when talking to a judge in a court of law!
if i recall correctly, in the RTC days the sfa wrote to all clubs asking for information on dodgy payments, presumably hoping for a “ach, they’re aw at it” outcome.
I think we’d have heard if they’d got the result they wanted.
Breaking news
Jimmy Hill died this morning, aged 87.
An injury time penalty the award of which has the BBC Radio commentators dumbfounded – guess who got that! Oh, and guess who missed it
When honest mistakes fail to help then reconstruction becomes more urgent.
The suggestion that a QC invented a loan payment which had nothing to do with the substance of the case he was defending is worrisome DCK must create a zone of incompetence around himself- it even worked to unseat the special one.
Even though we hated him for being a poof, RIP
Thank goodness Stephen McManus is OK. That was a worrying moment or two.
bfbpuzzled 19th December 2015 at 2:40 pm
==============================
More zone of dishonesty I would have thought.
The QC made a statement in Court.
That statement was not true.
Either he was told something that wan’t true or he just made it up.
Maybe he asked them and they said that yes it was paid, not realising that he would actually say it in open Court. It really wasn’t that relevant regarding whether or not King had breached a “gagging order”.
Humunculus etc,
just spotted that that on Phil’s site someone is saying that the Murray interview has been pulled from the STV site.
Could it be that a certain QC has been in touch regarding Murray’s comments about the QC being mistaken?
Just saying, like.
Cant think why it might have been pulled.
Maybe a public statement from RIFC could be around the corner.
Wow, looks like I whooshed a lot of people with the Jimmy Hill comment, perhaps the mods could delete.
I don’t think anyone ever really thought he batted for the other side and I’m not even sure we really hated him either. It was still a tartan army classic though and I am reliably informed that he enjoyed the banter of it.
Homunculus 19th December 2015 at 4:54 pm #bfbpuzzled 19th December 2015 at 2:40 pm==============================
More zone of dishonesty I would have thought.
The QC made a statement in Court.
That statement was not true.
Either he was told something that wan’t true or he just made it up.
Maybe he asked them and they said that yes it was paid, not realising that he would actually say it in open Court. It really wasn’t that relevant regarding whether or not King had breached a “gagging order”.
___________
I do wonder, though, if the statement caused SD’s legal team to change tactics. Perhaps their case was based, in part, on the loan remaining outstanding, hence the strange lack of effort in what they put forward. With it now established that, at the least, the court was misled by the ‘error’, I wonder if the judge will hear more of what the SD team had planned to put forward. I got the impression that all that was decided at the hearing was that King wouldn’t face incarceration, so I wonder if he will now be prepared to listen to further submissions at the next hearing due to this untruth being submitted by the defence.
We may never find out what caused the ‘mistake’ but I am sure his lordship will have had a quiet word with King’s counsel to establish the truth, and be rather unsympathetic with King if he discovers he lied to his counsel, even if he didn’t expect it to be raised in the proceedings. I could well imagine such a theatrical judge taking umbridge with someone making a mockery of his court!
The ‘mistake’ may have no bearing on how the case proceeds, but it could surely have removed some of the advantage King seemed to have gained from his lordships apparent disdain for Mike Ashley and SD. Even if it leads to nothing more than King/TRFC having to meet their own legal costs, it could mean a disasterous own goal by King was scored.
My wee club are problematic are they not?
Keep turning up and doing naughty stuff and helping along the big clubs. Like Stuart Milnes.
Armaggedon my ass.
Zero, you were out of order on at least two levels. But I will say that there was a bit of banter between Scottish supporters and Jimmy Hill. you have apologised, so least said.
Big Pink, I PMd yesterday.
Has PMCG been credited by full name by any newspaper for anything he has revealed?
He was today, by Andrew Smith in “The Scotsman” : “..Dave King writing to …..other Scottish clubs asking to meet- this communique appearing on the website of journalist Phil MacGiollaBhain.”
I don’t read many newspapers!
Some musings to help me fend off the feeling of impending doom. Its helpful I’m told. As Mike Wazowski might say “Think therapeutical thoughts!”
(In gruff Churchillian tones…mixed with a little bit of Samuel Jackson)
“I am speaking to you from the Eisenhower Rooms in Culzean Castle. Hmmph. We are living in turbulent times, beset on all sides by dark forces that wish to overthrow our fair game. Hmmpf. I am minded to consider how those with greatttt power and responsibility would deal with such evil intent. Those generals such as Eisenhower, with vaaaast resources and unemcumbered power would have been able to marshall his staff, his troops, and his will to strategies that would DEFEAT those who dare try to impune sporting integrity and allow HEINOUS financial and regulatory jiggerypokery to flourish unchallenged to threaten our dear soccerball game.”
I, however, am on a Groupon deal in those same Eisenhower apartments, with no power to marshal the forces of right to deal devastating blows to those who offend our values. I will however spout off on t’internet (when i get to the one room in this place with wifi).
We are indeed seeing a softening up campaign to do everything necessary to support TRFC getting into some kind of top league asap. Its probably been put firmly to the SFA beaks (love that phrase) that another year out of the top income stream will be the death of TRFC (or won’t generate enough cash for the “investors” to stick around).
Bampots such as ourselves, if i can actually call myself one, will of course be immune to the suggestions that it’s all for the “good of the game”, but we are not the target of those promoting the Big Lie and succulent lamb dinners. The hope is that us bampots will not be able to rouse the fans’ ire enough this time.
Following the fans successful pressure on the SPL clubs in 2012, we can surmise that deals had to be done, probably out of earshot of Mr Hutton, to give all the other leagues a year of the blue pound visiting their grounds as the “punishment” for RFC, not the actual consequence of their own actions, and that nothing more was to be said..ever. IIRC only Annan FC openly supported Turnbull – who I think were also newcomers, or was the chairman there a new chairman?
The SFA knew the LNS thing wouldn’t rock the boat and any fine would never be paid.
Anyhoo, this is partly why the clubs now have to keep schtum. They agreed to forego / forget / sacrifice sporting integrity, which if you recall was often described in derogatory terms in the SMSM at the time, for the duration of the uninterrupted march through the leagues. Ha Ha, eternal thanks to Motherwell FC who cheered most of us up at the end of last season and probably had a significant impact on TRFC’s chances of survival. Mind you, that last minute foul on our goalie to get a goal that put us third is still a hard one for us Dons fans to take, so you are not totally forgiven. Maybe I should blaming the ref though. See? …we do talk about football sometimes, but back to the matter in hand.
Nobody but those ensconced in the blue room probably suspected just how much asset stripping / lack of financial planning for stability would actually take place following TRFC/RIFC getting the go ahead to promote the big lie and raise millions on the market. This probably gave some pause for thought amongst the other chairmen & the beaks ( or regular purchases of brown trousers) , but they are too far down the road to admit guilt. They thought all would be well. Hell mend them. The monster is alive and well, is back again, and is terrorising the village – again.
The nature of the new league setup will likely be kept quiet as long as possible in order to maximise TRFCs chances if there is an insolvency event.
Remember the talk of an invited league? – nothing will be kept off the table when push comes to shove. Money talks, as it did in 2012. They are thinking- well we had to do it then, so if we have to do it again, well just this one more time, it’s no biggie, we can pretend its a fair game later on when things calm down. Our SFA chaps will also have calculated that UEFA and FIFA will be too busy to have any interest in Res 12 issues for the foreseeable future.
I think it was Frank Zappa that said politics is the entertainment division of the military-industrial complex. In the SFA, democracy and pretendy boards / committees are the fig leaves to hide the commercial – regulatory complex which is populated by the establishment. Disagree? Show me some evidence to the contrary.
The flies in the ointment of course are the finances of TRFC and the various court cases. Expect early payments for TRFC, more home games in cups, special Ibrox fixtures, etc as the things the SFA can do outwith league reconstruction.
My predictions? Tea leaf patterns today suggested that despite some best efforts not enough fans will persuade their clubs to do the right thing, Mr Milne’s hope that TRFC use “the right approach” will be sadly dashed and they continue as is, that court cases continue with little implication for continued asset stripping at TFRC/RIFC despite some of the individuals maybe not faring so well, but the Govan team will struggle on -on the pitch and off -in whatever top league is cobbled together if TRFC aren’t promoted, until sadly for their fans, including those in positions of power, there is just not enough money left or to be found.
Not even the most brotherly type of support will “square” up the books or prevent other non football regulatory risks or actions. At the end of the day there needs to be someone putting in millions of cash for no return, regularly. The flow of dough will stop.
When that happens is anyone’s guess, but a certain Mr Ashley’s guess might be closer than most.
We will not see sporting integrity rear its shiny head, no Luke Skywalker hero, no wise Yoda, just the harsh realities of business when this Trade Federation says farewell to one of it’s newest members that couldn’t keep up the payments.
As a certain Irish writer keeps reminding us, TRFC are a loss making business with no credit line at a bank.
As many contributors here remind us, the main problem is not TRFC however, its the ability of the sporting authorities to govern correctly, and we will have to live with that awful truth.
Most of us will continue to watch, finance and support our clubs and watch tv showings of football. Its all our faults, but some more than others.
Jeezy peeps, I read that back so now I’m off to top myself, – razor blade and hot bath? Or maybe just more of my unhealthy lifestyle…that should do it. When’s the next Dons game on Alba? Get the wine, pringles and condensed milk ready!
Or, Santa is very good to bampots and early in the new year many TRFC decision makers are suddenly no longer around, the bills don’t get paid, no new money comes in, and TRFC is liquidated. Assets are still in dispute, so no immediate new newco. SFA resignations abound, clubs reorganise the SFA and eventually a new and well run community club is formed which is successful in getting SFA membership according to normal rules. It does march through the leagues with a large number of sane and well behaved fans. What’s not to like?
BP,
<Running total on Yorkhill Fund is £135.56UPDATE: A poster from darn sarf – who wishes to remain anonymous – has agreed to donate £1 for every £2 donated by the rest of us.>
Should this not actually read “……has agreed to donate £5 for every £10 donated by the rest of us.”?
Scottish Football needs a good memory and to avoid remaking the mistakes of the past.
I’m sorry to disappoint anyone and ruin another conspiracy theory but the interview with Paul Murray is still on the STV website.
I do not think that the Scottish football authorities will attempt to re-structure the SPFL for the start of the 2016 / 2017 season. It’s too preposterous a suggestion for even them to try. Changing the rules of a competition during that competition is totally untenable.
Also, if you were to try to do it then the most sensible way would be to say that there was no relegation from the premiership but two teams were going up, giving a top division of 14. Then how would you decide the second team from the championship. Presumably through play-offs as planned. Only without the decider between the championship team and the premiership team.
So assuming they have no integrity at all and all 12 clubs currently in the top league agreed it plus say 4 from the championship, those realistically involved. That leaves another 26 clubs, what would be in it for them. What’s in it for the clubs in the championship next season, including the newly promoted ones, they have presumably budgeted for getting to play against teams with a bigger away support. Two of those have gone up, and none down to replace them. Why would they want that to happen
It could be argued that this may suit the “top” fourteen clubs, however they only represent one third of the clubs in Scottish senior football.
There may be re-structuring, I have no issue with that, however it cannot come in before the 2017 / 2018 season. The integrity of the whole of Scottish football, and in particular fairness to every club involved in it would be finally destroyed if they try to do it any other way.
I do not think they will even try it.
bad capt madman 20th December 2015 at 1:15 am
‘….We are indeed seeing a softening up campaign to do everything necessary to support TRFC getting into some kind of top league asap….’
________
In spades!
The offensive ‘charm offensive’ continued with Murray’s ” ..After everything we have been through in the past three or four years , we don’t want some league reconstruction or some artificial structure to make this thing work…..There should be no question of us being shoe-horned into the top league,that just shouldn’t happen.”
He’s damn right it shouldn’t happen. But I suspect he believes it will happen ( possibly having been already assured that arrangements are well in hand ) if Warburton fails to get TRFC promoted to the top league for the first time in its existence, and he is beginning the pretence that, if that circumstance eventuates, the league reconstruction that would be rushed through would not be occasioned by the need to ‘save’ TRFC.
The trouble with anything emanating from the Football Authorities and RIFC is predicated on the perpetuation of the Big Lie, and is therefore in itself vitiated. Until that Big Lie is recognised for what it was and is, there can be no sense of Truth, no ‘moving on’.
A very, very deliberate perversion of Truth was carried out, and simply must be recognised openly and corrective action taken, else the beautiful game as administered by the SFA will continue to be seen as rigged, and not worth a penny of our money, or our affection.
The earth is round, not flat. RFC was liquidated and is no more, in terms of a capacity to add to its sporting achievements. And some of its sporing achievements were won by serial breaking of the rules, and these must be removed from their otherwise disinguished record.
And the new club must not be allowed to continue to claim that that record is theirs.
There is no way round it, in Truth.
Giovanni 20th December 2015 at 7:44 am # I’m sorry to disappoint anyone and ruin another conspiracy theory but the interview with Paul Murray is still on the STV website.
_______
Thanks for the update, Gio, but it definitely disappeared on Friday evening for some reason, so maybe not ‘still on’, just more accurately described as ‘on again’
Now, there must be a conspiracy in there somwhere
Re the PM interview.
Is this the first time anyone from RIFC /TRFC has acknowledged that external funding isn’t possible until after the criminal proceedings are completed?
Consequently, does this mean that the £5m held by the lawyers was provided by current shareholders?
If the assets are not in doubt, why is external finance not possible?
So there I was giving the dogs a walk through the fields of Aberdeenshire (plenty time to gather thoughts!) of a Sunday morning and I got round to thinking about poor Kenny Miller.
Fair play to young(!) Kenny doing a spot of cheerleading for his beleaguered fitba club during the week. It was a ‘nice touch’ from a senior player and few could argue about his credentials of being a © Real Rangers Man.
Kenny has a problem though and he must know it. He’s too auld! As an RRM , he must realise in an ideal world, he’d be nowhere near the first team but if Waghorn departs in the window it will be all on him to notch the requisite
goals. I don’t think he’s up to it. I’m 43 now and attempted to play the no.9 role well into my 42nd year. Truth be told I should have given up when I was around 33 or 34 at a push. You still have all the positional sense, know the runs to make, know how to cheat to make the game a bit easier(!) etc, etc but the facts of the matter are the legs just aren’t what they used to be. Poor Kenny will know this feeling. He will also know the frustration of not having that extra second to take that final composing ‘nice touch’ before scoring another goal for his beloved club/team/company.
The second half of the Championship should be an exciting affair this season but it’s a young mans game Kenny.
My money’s on Hibs!
Agree with homunculus that we wont see a change for 2016/17.
It would be too obvious a fix and in practical terms it’s too late to make the change anyway.
HirsutePursuit 20th December 2015 at 11:19 am
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Who would lend the PLC money under the current circumstances, and on what terms.
They do not have proper, normal banking facilities including any line of credit / overdraft.
The have substantial trading losses in their first three years of existence. Absolutely staggering losses if you compare them to turnover.
It seems likely they will have further substantial trading losses this year. That will have to be covered by more borrowing, which can only really come from existing shareholders.
They have admitted to needing another £2.5m just to keep trading, and that they needed at least some of that in December.
They have existing debts of £5m to Mike Ashley and £3.75 to other shareholders. If the £5m is repaid it is likely that money is just now owed to someone else.
One of the main income streams, merchandising etc, is controlled by someone else for at least 7 years.
There are Court cases which cast doubt over who actually owns the major assets. So it may be difficult to use them as security.
Dis-application of pre-emption rights was rejected, so borrowing cannot really be repaid with equity. Which quite frankly wouldn’t be worth very much anyway given everything else.
There is almost no chance of external borrowing, any loans have to be based to a large extent on emotion, rather than good financial sense.
It’s as big a mess as the last club was in and it’s not getting any better from what I can see.
https://johnjamessite.wordpress.com/2015/12/20/the-assets/comment-page-1/#comment-4485
john james latest
tony 20th December 2015 at 1:04 pm
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“If Green and Whyte and their aides are convicted, the assets will revert to the Crown.”
I’m intrigued, where does he get that from. Does he mean it would be some sort of fine, or a confiscation under the proceeds of crime act.
It can’t really be the latter because that doesn’t actually seize the assets per se, it creates an amount equivalent to their value. Which the person can pay in any way they want.
“An application would then be made to the state by RIFC to retain the assets, and if there was no objection by BDO, and I am led to believe that they will not object, then the assets would remain in RIFC’s care.”
So the Crown would take the assets, then just give them to a PLC, or more accurately “…then the assets would remain in RIFC’s care.”
I don’t even know what that means.